Unemployment numbers revised upwards for August revised from 96,000 to 142,000, and September fell roughly in line with expectations (114,000). The cumulative effect is a decline in unemployment to 7.8%.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-05/u-s-jobl…
With the official rate below the 8% mark, what impact will this have on the election? I fully expect this to become a cornerstone of Obama's platform going into the final weeks of the election (although 7.8% isn't exactly something to boast about).
Yeah, I mean it is a simply number for simple people to understand. Labor participation is still low, the U6 number is actually higher. I read the BLS report and it looks like the majority of jobs were in two areas, nothing that would impact the general public.
Whatever. If 20bps below 8% is what gets Obama elected so be it. Fucking morons.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/september-us-jobs-up-114000-jobles-rat…
This is pretty good.
"The U.S. economy generated a lackluster 114,000 jobs in September, but the unemployment rate fell to 7.8% from 8.1%, the lowest level since January 2009, the government said Friday"
"The unemployment rate, which is drawn from a separate survey of households, was forecast to tick up to 8.2% from 8.1%. Yet the jobless rate fell sharply after the biggest increase in employment as measured by the household survey since 1983. Some 873,000 people in the household survey said they found jobs."
Seems pretty shady to me, especially after Romney honed in on the 8% unemployment mark.
In-before revision in a few weeks that lowers the employed numbers and raises unemployment rate back up.
With all respect, I don't see how it's "pretty shady." The number is what it is, whether due to participation or actual job creation. And with all respect to Patrick and the site, I really think comments like this are exactly the type of thing that shouldn't be allowed on this site. You can't let a political bias turn into senseless questioning of a sound statistic that we, as well as millions of other people, count on as an economic indicator, regardless of whether that statistic agrees with our views.
Edit:
Just to disclose, before someone calls me an Obama-head or something else: I'm Pro-Romney on the issue of economics, and a lot of others as well.
Relax, dude. Both parties conveniently use either the household survey or the establishment survey as it suits them. I won't harp on it because Bush did the same thing, but even if you think the household survey is completely legit, the overall picture isn't as rosy when we're creating fewer than average jobs in September. So no, I don't think we should ban TNA or edit his comments or anyone else's.
Thanks internet censor. And LOL at your sound statistic. The U3 is crap. Go look at the U6 which actually ticked up. And my "shady" comment is reflected by the link and quotes I included in the post. I will reiterate.
"The unemployment rate, which is drawn from a separate survey of households, was forecast to tick up to 8.2% from 8.1%. Yet the jobless rate fell sharply after the biggest increase in employment as measured by the household survey since 1983. Some 873,000 people in the household survey said they found jobs."
1) Forecast to increase to 8.2%
2) Yet the jobless rate fell sharply after the biggest increase in employment as measured by the household survey since 1983.
Sorry if that doesn't raise some alarm bells in your mind. It does for me and a lot of other people.
Zerohedge does a good job explaining this farce.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-05/reason-todays-unemployment-rat…
Considering unemployment numbers can easily be "massaged" and left like that for weeks until revisions I think it is perfectly legitimate to call this sudden, unexpected drop in unemployment "shady" in the after-math of the debates.
Sorry buddy but you're not as smart as you think.
The best thing for Mitt Romney to advise the unemployed to do is LOOK FOR JOBS IN OCTOBER.
Shoot the unemployment rate up to 9% and it'l be the deciding factor before people go vote.
I think our current labor force participation is around 63%? Since I don't have a frame of reference to "the better days", anyone out there knows what is considered a healthy rate?
Realistically, the participation rate, like all-in-total tax rates, doesn't vary much over time and the debates are over very small percentages. The thing that does change is what percent of the money is recirculated into the general system/economy vs hoarded/concentrated and who is paying what percent of the taxes. Who pays for what, gets paid what, and what tax money is spent on......well, that's the focus of the debates
I don't understand either. Jobs added goes down, but so does the unemployment rate? I've heard a lot about the labor participation rate being a major factor--meaning that the rate looks better as more people "give up" looking for work. Unfortunately, it's hard to get a analysis on these numbers and what they mean without obvious party leanings, which makes me not want to read about them at all.
But honestly this is just a number and has no impact on my decision anyways.
Well monkeys, I know a lot of us out there are looking at jobs, so I thought I'd run through the BLS table B data to show you some exciting industries were the growth is, to better focus your efforts:
1) Food Service & Drinking places +15,700 jobs 2) Clothing & Clothing Accessories Stores +9,500 jobs 3) Transit & Ground Passenger Transportation +9,200 jobs 4) Real Estate +7,100 jobs 5) Services to Buildings & Dwellings +6,400 jobs
So, are you ready to be a waiter, janitor, bus/taxi driver, or sell khakis at J.Crew? Because if not, you're going to be stuck in Real Estate.
(note: This is not an exact list, but these represent 5 of the top 10, and #1 is the overall #1. The other 5 are three health care fields, non-USPO federal workers, and teachers.)
2/3 of the jobs added were only part-time jobs and the July and August numbers were adjusted higher. There is a lot of holiday hiring and people settling for PT jobs.
I don't understand how you can go back and manipulate previous months numbers but then again i'm not an economist.
Source: http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2012/10/05/why-did-the-unemployment-rate…
Most economists prefer to look at the employment-population ratio because it is not sensitive to labor force participation. If you look at that chart, the much touted employment recovery from over 10% to where we are today looks near nonexistent (http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000).
That being said, 8% has become a psychologically important number, so I'm sure the new data point will play prominently in Obama's political rhetoric.
FSC needs to chill out. The fact is that this is a huge construct of the fact that the labor participation rate has been falling during the recession. More people are willing to take early retirement, collect unemployment, etc. than work in an insecure job that pays less than before. Plus, they might not even be able to find said job. My friend works at a charity in NC and he said that they can't place homeless people in jobs because all the menial jobs (cashier, McD's, etc.) are filled by college educated people and older people with a lot of experience. So people get disheartened and tae the easy way out. UFO's graphic makes it look like the labor participation rate has stayed pretty even over the past decade or so, but you have to remember that the slight downtrend in the graph is millions of people giving up, combined with the other factors that make up unemployment I would assume that unemployment would be a good amount higher if we had the same LFP as in the late 90s early 00's.
Sorry if you have an issue with looking past the headline number.
I think people have more of an issue with your overt political bias, but I could be wrong. I learned long ago to ignore any political oriented post by you or brady (as well as his mba posts for that matter). Perhaps others would be wise to do the same.
Ultimately, people are entitled to their opinions and there is very little you can do to stop people from expressing them.
Then don't take TNA's word for it. Read the analyses from zero hedge and other economic and financial experts. They are certainly as competent as a $50,000/year federal bureaucrat when it comes to analyzing economic data.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-05/former-ge-ceo-jack-welch-says-…
Jack Welch calling them shady also.
I'm perfectly aware that the employment stats can be nudged according to what people want to see, who cares if unemployment bounced by a few basis points. I'm also aware that I think the GOP would be really really really bad for the country at this point. Hmmm, lets see: * started decade long unwinnable war * ran up HUGE deficit because of that war * cut taxes... Fucking duh, you raise taxes to pay for wars. governing 101. * juiced housing market to keep the gravy train rolling * turned a blind eye towards overheating banks * result is systemic meltdown * were TOLD this was all a bad idea * somehow rationalize it. It's truly amazing the bullshit coming from the right these last few years.
Now they're pissed that the current president hasn't fixed THEIR mistakes fast enough? Dude, I don't care what one metric or another says, and I question the critical reasoning faculties of anyone trying to say that the GOP and dem worldviews are even remotely close at this point. I'm a former, lifelong republican that has divorced themself from the GOP. As far as I'm concerned, Obama just has to make some headway with the debt over the next four years and I'm a happy camper. Maybe Romney is a good guy, I don't know
....but I also don't care.
Partisans who value their party over the country baffle me, it's just a political party, not a religion or a family. One side clearly needs to rethink what they're about: example, show me ONE republican president who's balanced the federal budget since Eisenhower. Yeah, thought so, doesn't exist. The other party isn't completely and totally insane, so I'm camping out there for a while. I encourage you to do the same or at least take a serious look at what you're agreeing to....it's tantamount to either (1) blind faith or (2) you're part of the lie/incompetance. If the GOP picks someone smart like Christie in 2016 them maybe....maybe...I'll revist their side. But until then, I just can't. I'm done and just have nothing nice to say about them.
And trust me, it was REALLY REALLY hard for me to admit this to myself years ago. But hey, fuckit, it's just politics and I aint in that game. Not like what I think is going to change a damn thing, so life goes on.
Whoa.
1) No one is talking about Bush.
2) These numbers are out of the ordinary.
3) When you look at the actual BLS report instead of the headline number you see where the job growth was and where it wasn't.
And I would call this suspicious if Bush was in office. The numbers are screwy. But thanks for regurgitating your anti Republican talking points instead of discussing the validity or lack thereof with regards to the U3 numbers.
And uhm, yeah, I kinda went off on a tangent. Slow day at the office?
It's pretty obvious that you wouldn't. I don't care about internet censorship, my point is that what you're saying is 100% baseless speculation. Unless you're one of the persons putting that number together or have a direct inlet to see the process behind what concluded it (the surveys), you've got no evidence to demonstrate that it's "shady".
Your opinion is fine to have, but it looks stupid on us as a whole when people start saying that things aren't real just because they don't agree with their personal view. If it was a massive upswing in unemployment to 11%, you'd be right there saying, "yeah, it's Obama's fault, see where he got us!" Forget the fact that a M-to-M swing of 3% is fucking ridiculous.
So yeah, just temper your comments. It sounds stupid for a successful professional to say the official jobless report is "shady" on some internet site. Next thing you know, FOX or some other site is quoting you on it.
Wow, so first you call for me to be censored for calling the biggest increase in household employment since 1983 shady. Especially when generated a below estimate 114,000 jobs, labor participation still hangs at 63% and U6 increased. Plus you had two upward revisions and estimates expected the rate to increase to 8.2, not decrease to 7.8.
All this on the heals of a debate which Obama lost, which Romney brought up the 8% unemployment.
So I think I have enough to say that things look off. And I am also not the only one, as I have supported through posting links.
But thanks man, I am stupid. I'd happily say things looked shady if asked again. This is a fluff number anyway. And it looks like I am not the only one who has doubt in these numbers, whether calling them massaged or just saying that they are irrelevant because it is an increase in part time workers.
Either way what I said was no where near out of bounds.
I don't think that it is "shady" or manipulated. It's just that the job growth is pretty much unhealthy. Part time job workers went from 582,000 in Aug. to 8,613,000 now. Yea, that's what we need, people giving up on FT work for PT. Less money, less benefits, less skills. Plus the increase in people giving up on job seeking that's why I don't think that this report os good. I don't think Obama went in with his pencil and erased some of the people searching for jobs.
Either way, the dude who wins is going to increase the debt and pretty much coast until the economy fixes itself. The only thing that the President can really do in my opinion is fuck it up. That said, I think Obama's policies (ignoring fiscal cliff, Obamacare, etc.) with fuck it up more than Romney's ideas.
God, why couldn't Gary Johnson be the Republican nominee?
Yeah man, zero hedge is great. Rather dour, but thought out arguments. The comments are good also for invoking thought. I've been on that site more and more.
Creditwritedowns.com is another great site.
Looks like we have a BLS employee on the board or something. Cannot believe someone would defend U3 numbers this vigorously. As if it is beyond imagine that these numbers could be tweaked slightly. I mean the government doesn't do things like this.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/10/05/162352854/unemployment-r…
NPR actually does a really good job going over things. I recommend reading it.
That article states the same things that you can find everywhere else about the number. It isn't shady at all. More people with part-time work (however still underemployed), less people looking for work (thus out of the labor force), and a few people actually found work (further raising the number).
I'm sure we've all taken an econ class or two before. Things are not always as they seem, and we get that. But there's no reason to say that something is strange just because it has good timing.
I'll tell you what, Obama was pretty off in the last debate. I bet someone took his notes beforehand and he was stuck winging it. Right? Of course not - he screwed up. Same thing here - Romney's got to deal with a jobs report that, in the mainstream media, favors Obama. Facts are facts.
FSC = fuckin stupid cunt
Shitty source, but explains it well.
http://economics.about.com/od/unemploymentrate/f/labor_force.htm
As for where we are historically with labor participation, we are about where we were in 1983.
Now about my shady comment. More people questing it.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/jobs-report-met-skepticism_653731.h…
I am not saying outright that the BLS manipulated things. I am not saying outright that there was fraud, but I get a little suspicious when such an abnormally high pop happens right after a debate and a month or so before elections. Maybe nothing is up, but I think it is suspicious.
Either way it is nothing but a headline number as more people are taking part time jobs. All the other measures of employment are crappy, but I suppose this will give Obama a good talking point.
But what does the labor force participation actually tell us, how should this be interpreted? The working age population has grown pretty significantly since 1983, so is the issue that the numerator is shrinking or the denominator is growing?
Seems to me it is a pretty useless datapoint without any context...
.....
Ugh. This is going to help obama immensely and will deflect his poor debate performance and a lousy 4-year record.
Why are the republicans complaining when the DOW is at a 5-year high?
Money > politics.
That probably has more to do with QE1, QE2 and QE3 than with who is in the White House.
Financial Markets ≠ Economy
Just printed it out and will read it over the weekend. Thanks!
I thought the concept of cooking the books was absurd at first (didn't even think they could), but after reading several analyses from several economic experts, I'm convinced that there was some manipulation, probably on the household survey. The numbers simply don't add up. I think in December we'll see some major revisions of October and November numbers.
In fact, I think we should start a betting pool.
Listen, I am obviously not a fan of Obama, but if you don't question things in life you have bigger issues than my political bias. This is an abnormal jump, days after losing a debate, a month or so from a Presidential election. Obama's camp is already using this headline number for campaigning purposes.
And I reiterate. If Bush, Romney, etc were in office I would question these numbers also. Oh, FYI, I am not the one calling for the internet police to silence opinions.
Hmmmmmm. How interesting...
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-11/data-massaging-continues-initi…
[quote=TNA]Hmmmmmm. How interesting...
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-11/data-massaging-continues-initi…] While I do agree that the numbers can be fudged a few basis points, I doubt that the entire difference is possible to fake. LOL I didn't hear the GOP coming up with conspiracy theories when the last two sets of numbers told the story they liked (aka, America is failing, and it's because of Obama). You could also look at it this way: http://static1.businessinsider.com/image/4f07154769bedd0957000015/chart…
Dems pitch to American public: "Don't be fooled by the deliberate misinterpretation of one metric, look at the big picture: the GOP is bitching because I haven't fixed their mistakes fast enough? And their solution is to....put them back in charge??? Sounds like an act of lunacy on their part."
Not saying I agree or disagree with the above logic, just pointing out the argument the GOP is up against. Groupthink isn't good debate prep, so that's why I'm posting this. Obama's task of saying the nation is better off now than when he came into office is slam dunk easy..."if it's not good enough for the GOP, one might wonder by what right the criticize anyone considering how things cratered under their administration."
I'm not sure how Romney can counter this.
You're probably also not sure how Mitt Romney mopped the floor with Obama in the debate--he did so because Obama's record is indefensible. $5 to $6 trillion in new debt; with employment participation at January 2009 levels there is an 11% unemployment rate; there are 23 million people unemployed or underemployed, etc.
You have to be a real Obama homer to not know how Romney would counter against the proposed assertion.
Not really sure why thing has to revert back to "Well the GOP did/didn't do XYZ". Maybe the GOP didn't complain about the numbers because they didn't have abnormal jumps or missing states.
Either way my intention is not to overly politicize these number. Whether something shady was going on, something sloppy or nothing at all, the employment picture in this country sucks and isn't being reflected in the headline numbers that come out.
I just think it is interesting how the unemployment rate dropped and anyone who questioned it was skewered and condemned and now this happens. God forbid the citizens question what the government is telling us.
In my mind, I'm going to file this under the same sort of trickery as the 2000 election results: good on paper but very possibly shady. Even so, it's just one data point, the overall picture is better than '08 and '09 when almost a million people a year were getting canned. So what if the new jobs created aren't as high as we'd all like, realistically, they're better than they were 4 years ago. Change the subject or subjectively zero in on one data point....but the larger point remains. If unemployment is 6% or 9%, it's besides the point: more jobs are being created than lost, so it's an improvement over the way things were. I'm simply calling it like I see it.
So it looks like California didn't contribute to the report. Interesting ...
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/10/11/bls-fail-jobless-cla…
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